Repeating this advice: if you used your generator last week to keep power to your house in Southern California, it most likely needs an oil change. Do it before Monday. They need an oil change every 100 hours. 5w30 or 10w30 depending on your model, usually. #generators #backuppower #PSPS #poweroutages

I recently found that many cheap AC chargers for LiFePO4 batteries don't actually trickle or float charge, even if the product listing says they do. They charge the battery to full and then shut themselves off. They must be power cycled to restart charging.

So the instrument attached to the battery (with charger connected) ran until the battery was discharged, then shut down and lost data. This is a scientific instrument in the basement that requires 12VDC even through power outages, and after the last lead acid battery died I switched to LiFePO4.

My tentative solution is to put the charger on a 7-day timer, and once or twice a week turn it on for a few hours.

Random question (ANSWERED!) for the misc. computer/electronics folks hanging out here. Has anyone tried replacing their UPS batteries (12V SLA/AGM) with the equivalent LiFePO4 replacements? (probably a reliable brand, like Bienno). Different charge points, but (in theory) the BMS in the batteries should not care? (UPDATE: Agreement was that you need a LiFePO4 compatible charger, and this will not work as a drop in solution, unless a battery has been designed as a drop in -- which the ones I had been looking at are NOT. Thanks everyone!) #batteries #LiFEPO4 #backuppower #electronics